Scotty stood there with a blue icy pop in his hand, five years old and 100 pounds. He and mom had just returned from a routine doctor’s visit. “The pediatrician says he’s overweight,” Mom was telling me, in obvious denial of the physician’s diagnosis.

From my daughters’ babysitting Scotty, I knew the child’s diet consisted of sugared cereals, soda pop, snack (junk) foods, and mac ‘n’ cheese. “He won’t eat any fruit,” she claimed, though my girls had succeeded in serving him (unsweetened) applesauce in low-fat yogurt. Children eat whatever you feed them, even if it takes a while.

Are we Clueless regarding Nutrition?
Another dear friend, who has always had weight issues and periodically claims to be dropping some pounds, slathers cheese across vegetables. Pleeeeeeeeeeze squeeze lemon juice on those veggies! No butter, no cheese.

A health care research company recently asked 11,000 adults across the US about their exercise and eating habits. Based on the respondents’ self-reported height and weight each person’s body mass index (BMI) was calculated. They must have told the truth because the sample fell right into the nation’s demographic profile:
• Underweight: 200
• Normal weight: 3,800
• Overweight: 4,200
• Obese: 3,100

With 7,300 of the 11,000 sample being overweight or obese, still they claim they’re eating healthy and exercising. We’re dealing with massive nutritional ignorance and massive cognitive dissonance (that can’t be rolls of fat—it’s a “funny mirror”). The survey results:
• 24 percent of normal-weight people said they always read nutrition labels
• 19 percent of the obese claimed to do so, too

• 24 percent of normal-weight people said they snack two or more times each day
• 28 percent of the obese said the same

• 31 percent of normal weight people claimed to clear the plate (eat the whole portion) at restaurants
• 41 percent of the obese said the same

• 75 percent of the obese described their eating habits as “healthy”, and 40% claimed to perform vigorous exercises at least 3x/week

To put this somewhat into perspective, last week a national poll showed that 50% of Americans believe, or we should say “convinced themselves”, that we did find WMD in Iraq, which, for the record, none was found after spending nearly $1 billion searching for it. So Americans can fool themselves on many dimensions.

Portion Control
Anyone of normal weight who eats all the food served at a restaurant doesn’t eat out often. The national average is now one in three meals daily eaten out of the home. The only self defense is to 1) share one entrée with a friend and perhaps order an extra side dish, or 2) upon the meal being served, ask for a take-home container and divide the dish BEFORE you begin eating. In the US the servings are 2 to 4x what a portion should be. The total amount consumed in a seating should be—for healthy eating– no more than what you can hold in both palms—and not heaped up either!

Regarding snacking two or three times a day, What are you snacking on? If it’s not being taken from the vegetable bin or the fruit basket, it’s probably not healthy. And how much are you eating at one time? A few short celery sticks or a bag full of chips without any nutritional value and chemicals that will harm you?

Nutrition Labels
What do the Ingredients labels mean? In the late ‘90s when no-fat and low-fat became the latest fad in foods, my daughters read the nutrition labels looking for the lowest numbers in the Fat category, oblivious to the Calories of the product.

Studies have shown that low-fat salad dressings result in low-absorption of all the meal’s nutrients. Blood tests were taken before consumption of the meal and nine hours later comparing low-fat to regular dressings. Good nutrition requires fats to absorb nutrients; healthy fats include olive oil and sesame oil, plus a few others.

Another recent poll reported that while most people read the Nutrition label, they don’t have any criteria to evaluate what they’re reading, and they buy the product regardless. Perhaps, we feel guilty or foolish if we don’t read the label, but we really have no or little knowledge to evaluate what we’re reading.

This isn’t the place for a course in nutrition, but here are some guidelines regarding food choices.

General rule: the shorter the Ingredients label the better and safer the food (I balk at using the word “pure” with food on the US grocery shelves). The longer the Ingredients list, the more chemicals, additives, etc.

Case in point: Breyers Ice Cream when sold in Michigan in the early 80s had four ingredients: milk, cream, sugar, and flavoring. And it was as good as homemade. When the company was bought out by a food giant, the list of ingredients expanded to all the various gums, and Breyers is now indistinguishable on the shelves.

And labels lie. The FDA has recently approved “0 Trans Fat” labels on foods that actually have less than .05% per serving (they claim its measurement is unreliable), but, remember, that’s “just a little bit” with every serving you eat. And now beef can be labeled as “Grass-fed” when it’s no such thing.

What to Do
This is especially for feeding our kids. And these good habits will improve your health as well!

• Number 1 Rule: Kids eat whatever you offer them. If it’s new to them, it may take a while of sitting at the table, but when nothing else is an option, hunger will eventually require they eat that vegetable, fruit, or whatever. The younger they are when you start this, the easier it is.

• Get the kids to help prepare the food. They can scrub the celery, you chop it, and they put peanut butter into it. They can add raisins, and you have “ants on a log”. Have fun with food!

• Cut, dice and shape fruits and veggies into kid-friendly pieces. They may balk at a whole apple, but cut in wedges it’s more likely to disappear. Oranges cut into slices are more appealing to everyone. Food garnishing tools can be used by a 6-yo; they make the table glamorous and food prep delightful. Believe me, a cucumber as a shark and green pepper as a palm tree (carrot trunk) are much more delectable than plain veggies. Food garnishing takes minutes, and is so rewarding.

• Don’t buy Sugared Cereals or any Snack Chips. If it’s not in the pantry, they won’t be eating it. Pan-popped popcorn was my daughters’ only carbohydrate snack. Potato chips and tortilla chips were in the cupboard and served only as a complement to a meal—they weren’t snacking foods.

• Prepare meals at home, and have the children work as “second cook” (any title enhances the position, and give them their own apron). It’s good together time, and they learn many skills such as motor skills and mathematics with measuring. They appreciate, and are more likely to eat, what they’ve helped prepared. And you’re getting assistance with meals.

When we were headed down the mac’n’cheese road, I decided every other night I would cook a 4- or 5-course meal of my choice. For my one finicky eater, who ate very little of anything, the back-up meal was (plain, unsweetened) yogurt and applesauce or cottage cheese and applesauce. That’s “comfort food” for all of us yet today.

The premise behind this discussion of kids and food is BE A PARENT. Your responsibility as a parent is not to please the child but to feed them only what will nurture their good health and well-being. And controlled portions of that, too!

To your good health! Salud!